


Random Scenes, Badly Cast

by Shardarch



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-31
Updated: 2013-01-31
Packaged: 2017-11-27 17:33:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/664607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shardarch/pseuds/Shardarch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I don't usually write fanfic based on the first episode alone but - well. Sherlock. What can I say? Not beta'ed or even read much by anyone else. My first attempt at posting so please forgive the formatting errors. Thanks for reading.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Random Scenes, Badly Cast

**Author's Note:**

> I don't usually write fanfic based on the first episode alone but - well. Sherlock. What can I say? Not beta'ed or even read much by anyone else. My first attempt at posting so please forgive the formatting errors. Thanks for reading.

Random Scenes, Badly Cast

All the world is a stage, but the play is badly cast. - O. Wilde

He woke up struggling with his nightmare as always, breathing hard to drag the remembered smell of ammunition and heat and sand into his lungs again, sweating, almost crying in his want and repulsion. Reciting his name and rank in his head to bring himself back into the present, cutting the service number off to put the word ‘retired’ in. /Doctor John H. Watson, Captain. Retired. Doctor John H. Watson. Captain. Retired. Doctor John H. Watson. Eight two one - damn. Retired./

He woke up in the cold hours before dawn, as always, almost crying, to realize this time he wasn’t not alone.

(It had been three months since Jennifer Wilson died. They had known each other three months, maybe, when this happened. Almost a quarter of a year. His hands had stopped shaking entirely most days. The cane lived behind the door. Occasionally he threatened people with it.)

He pulled the sheet up, not far enough but it wouldn’t go far enough with the weight of Sherlock Holmes sitting on it. “What the hell are you doing?” It came out wrong, whispered as if to avoid waking some third party, soggy with emotion and remembered heat.

“You had a nightmare,” Sherlock said. “Sounded like you were dying.”

“I was.” John looked away, tried to come back with a grin to ward off the truth. “I’m not now, though.”

“No.” Sherlock was looking at his shoulder, the one torn by bullets, stiff now with the rain that still tapped on the little window. He reached out a hand towards that shoulder.

“Don’t.”

“It doesn’t hurt.” Anyone else - anyone else would have been reassuring -This won’t hurt - or even gentle - I won’t hurt you - but, well. Sherlock. One fact and the barest hesitation and then Sherlock’s hand was on his shoulder, fingertips on the great scar. John’s breath went out of him in a sigh that was almost a sob but he didn’t flinch.

After, he would wonder why he hadn’t jerked away. It might have been the late night, the dream that still paralyzed him, the rain that made him know pain would follow with sudden movements.

It might have been that Sherlock’s touch was light, unexpectedly respectful. Warm.

“Two bullets,” Sherlock murmured. “Close range. The muzzle was almost touching you. These are exit wounds - through your back, then. You were face down on the ground. They’d had you a whole day. Your back was still bleeding from the whips. They threatened your legs next, perhaps -”

“Don’t.” He turned away as he said it but privacy was impossible with Sherlock Holmes. He would infer the rest from thin air. Don’t hurt me like this. 

Sherlock stood and went to the door but paused there. “You could have made something up,” he said, examining the carpet with care. “People lie.”

John drew in a shaky breath. “I couldn’t. Once I started talking - “ he shook his head. “It was say everything or say nothing.”

“And you chose to be a hero.” Anyone else would have been admiring, consoling, sarcastic. Sherlock Holmes dealt in facts, though.

John let himself smile a little. “Wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.” Sherlock laughed his dry chuckle. “How did you know about the whips?”

“I saw the scars when you were prowling around in the kitchen the other night.”

“I didn’t see you.”

“I didn’t want company.” Sherlock smiled a little at his look. “Neither did you.”

“Okay.” Privacy was impossible with Sherlock Holmes. “It was going to be the knee next.”

“Right leg.”

“Lucky guess.”

“I never guess.”

“And three bullets. In my shoulder. One’s still in there.”

“There’s always something.” John found he could answer Sherlock’s smile. “See you in the morning, John.”

“Right. Okay.” John lay back and didn’t hear the door close. He found a mostly comfortable position and watched the grey and yellow shadows of the rain across the window and did not notice slipping from abstract awareness to dreamless sleep.

 

“So.” 

“So?”

“Sociopath.” Sherlock looked over the edge of his laptop and John Watson fidgeted with the cane that wasn’t actually sliding off the arm of his chair. “It’s a big word.”

“No, rudimentary is a big word. And actually describes the general knowledge of the condition of sociopath.” Sherlock bent his gaze back to this screen.

(It was less than a week since Jennifer Wilson died. They had known each other no time at all, really, when this happened. John held the cane more than he leaned on it but never lifted anything with his left hand, in case it shook.)

“I am a doctor,” John said, quiet but sharp.

“Medical , not psychological.” Sherlock didn’t look up. “They’re pig’s eyes, by the way.”

“Yes, I can tell a pig’s eye when I see one, thank you.” John took a breath, made himself smile and ignore the question of eyes in the microwave just as he had that morning when he made coffee. “Who diagnosed you?”

“Excuse me?”

At least he was looking up now, engaged to some extent. John made a point to meet his eyes. He’d already learned that it was expedient to keep Sherlock’s attention. “You didn’t diagnose yourself. You’re clever but -”

“Genius. Official I.Q. of two hundred.”

“Really?”

“I have the papers. They tested us quite a bit as children.”

“Us.” He was losing Sherlock to the computer again.” “You and Mycroft,” John said and watched Sherlock’s back straighten and his eyes narrow at nothing on the screen.

“Mycroft,” Sherlock growled. “Twenty points higher.”

“I’m sorry? Your brother has an I.Q. of two hundred and twenty?”

“On at least one occasion, yes. He told our parents I was a sociopath, although it was perfectly obvious really.”

“Okay.” John nodded twice. “Sorry, your older brother said you were a sociopath and your parents just -”

“No, of course not. There were tests, therapists. Quacks.” Sherlock looked resolutely at the computer but he wasn’t seeing it. “Mycroft doesn’t lie. You’ve met him.”

“Yes. Yes, I have.” John settled back into his chair. “I don’t believe it.”

“What?”

“Sociopaths have no moral code. No remorse.”

“Yes. And?” 

John gestured with his coffee cup. “You work with the police. Why go after criminals without a moral code?”

“Because law abiding citizens don’t commit crimes.” Sherlock looked back at him with impatience. “Boring. Are we done?” 

“If you were that bored, you’d commit the crimes yourself. People would be dropping like flies.” Sherlock acknowledged the shot with a raised chin and a faint smile. “But where would your admiring audience be? Criminals don’t get praised, they just go to prison.”

The grey eyes widened, incredulous that John would think he could be caught. “Lestrade and the others don’t exactly shower me with praise,” Sherlock said. “Are you seriously trying to psychoanalyze me?”

“Not doing a bad job either. You were upset when I found out about your history of drug use.”

“Who says I have one?”

John leaned forward, bracing himself under the haughty gaze. Sometimes it swept at him like a winter wind and he wanted to turn his back to it. “Your reaction to Lestrade the other night says so.”

And of course Sherlock smiled. “Touché. Yes. Well spotted.” And then he looked away. “Ancient history. Doesn’t matter.”

“That implies a moral code,” John said. “You care about society’s standards enough to be upset when someone finds out you’ve broken them.”

“Wrong. I get irritated when small minded people judge where they have no right.”

They stared at each other for a moment.

“Inflated sense of self worth,” Sherlock said quietly. “Classic symptom, wouldn’t you say, Doctor?” John shifted in his chair. “Run down the list. I’ve got them all.”

“Everybody does.” John grimaced at his coffee and cleared his throat, getting his voice back to a softer level. “Everybody does. It’s not the symptoms, it’s how you manage them. And you do manage. You do amazing things and solve crimes. I don't believe it."

The silence stretched and then broke. "It doesn't matter what you believe," Sherlock said. 

The laptop clicked shut. 

By the time John looked up, he was gone.

 

John woke up because of the smallest of sounds, the shiver of a door being pushed shut softly, the footfalls of someone determined not to make noise. The light through his window said it was daytime again. He wondered what day.

He rolled - carefully, slowly and with great care - to his side to see the clock. Three thirty glowed at him and he signed. Time for a pain pill and Sherlock grumbling halfheartedly about the TV programming he’d be wasting brain cells on until the pills kicked in and he could sleep again. John blinked and started the transition to flat on his back. It really didn’t hurt that badly anymore. He let his eyes drift shut, considering what kind of argument it might take to make Sherlock understand he didn’t need a pill quite yet. Sherlock, so careless of himself and other people around him, had proven an exacting nurse.

(Jennifer Wilson had died almost a year ago. They had known each other nine months or more when this happened. John thought sometimes that it was enough time to make a whole new person and maybe that’s what actually happened, though he wasn’t sure who was new. He didn’t know where the cane had got to and slapped off the alarm with whatever hand was closest in the morning, careful not to disturb the only real furnishing his room had. A carved panther, light catching in the curves of its dark wood hide, watched him patiently from beside the alarm clock. It hadn’t exactly been a gift, coming without a card or any announcement whatsoever. John had left it where it had been placed, where it was one of the first things he saw when he woke.)

He couldn't pinpoint the sound that woke him but with his eyes closed his ears kicked up. A clink of cups in the sink. Sherlock making tea? There was usually tea with the pills, sometimes some biscuits straight from the package. It seemed to be understood that bullying him into taking pills and bringing him food and drink to make that possible was enough of a concession and a plate would be sheer luxury. But there was something else, someone else moving in the flat below. A chair leg scrapped across the floor. Heavier footsteps. Not Mrs. Hudson, she would be chattering and fussing at Sherlock to get a plate. 

John opened his eyes and maneuvered himself carefully into a sitting position, which proved so instantly uncomfortable he swung his legs immediately over the bed to stand up. And had to sit uncomfortably a moment more while the stabbing pain from his side died again to an angry ache. He smiled ruefully; stabbing was very apt. He'd never before realized how completely appropriate 'stabbing pain' really was until he himself was stabbed. And in pain because of it.

His feet fell directly into the slippers, put there by someone who watched him stand and knew where his feet would fall when he went to get up. The slippers were a little warmer for it.

Once unsteadily on his feet, he lurched to the door and leaned there a moment, considering his first solo assault on the stairs. Twelve of them, down to the flat where there would be tea and telly and a pain pill that was sounding more like a good idea with every passing minute. John nodded a couple of times to get his courage up and grasped the stair rail boldly.

Halfway down he was clinging to it for dear life, licking sweat off his lip and generally trying not to die. Optimism flat on your back was one thing, it seemed, and halfway down the stairs it fled entirely. The prudent thing to do would be to call for help. The satisfying thing would be to struggle back up the steps and get back into bed and call for help.

In the end, he chose the stubborn thing to do and staggered down slowly, dizzy unto falling but not actually falling. He reached the door with a sharp word in his mouth that he would have gladly unleashed except there were sharp words already flying around, too quiet to hear from the bedroom but unmistakable now that he was closer.

Mycroft was in the flat.

John stood outside the door, listening and trembling with his weariness and his pain but not quite daring to go in.

"I don't care what you think," Sherlock said and his voice was colder than John had ever heard it. "Get out."

"Please, Sherlock, don't let's make this more difficult than it has to be." Mycroft sounded tired, too reasonable. John shook his head. Sherlock's attention could be held with bluster and dramatics, his mind could be changed by logic, but being reasonable at him would only result in temper. Challenge him and all would be well, reason with him - only contempt would result. "She has asked you to be there."

"I told you on the phone I wasn't going to be. I'll call to tell her as well."

"You know perfectly well Mummy does not speak on the phone." Now there was an older brother's snap to the tone, which would work better but John thought that things had devolved beyond help since neither brother seemed to notice his presence. "This has been on the calendar for weeks."

"I can't leave," Sherlock said flatly. "Do what you want about the will."

Mycroft sighed. "I'm sure Mrs. Hudson would look after Doctor Watson for the evening."

"Mrs. Hudson is having a lie down." That was code for Mrs. Hudson having two of her herbal soothers and a glass of wine and popping in her Torchwood DVDs to swoon over Jack and Ianto. Inviting her up to the flat when she was in one of those moods was - awkward. 

"It has been a week since the accident."

And John heard an astonishing thing; Sherlock's voice raised in anger. Not contempt, not impatience or crowing triumph, but actual anger. "It was not an accident, Mycroft. He was stabbed. It required surgery. It was luck they didn't hit his lung because he would have died right there while I was chasing some damned murderer. He was almost dead in the ambulance. So you'll forgive me if I don't go rushing off to some stupid petty family meeting and leave him to the care of a drunken fool."

He would regret the drunken fool later, John knew. Mrs. Hudson would receive flowers for no reason and be flustered and pleased.

Mycroft sniffed. "Very well. Bring him along. We can make him comfortable in the parlor."

"No."

"Oh for heaven's sake, Sherlock. Now you are being childish.”

“I am not arguing, I am not being childish, and I am. Not. Going.”

Mycroft let the echoes of that die away. John could imagine his raised eyebrows, the irritatingly adult angle of his head. “Why not? I’m sure the rest of the family would love to meet your new friend.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s mine!”

John started upright. It was a far cry from Sherlock’s usual mode of adult temper tantrum whine and bitch. The genuine voice of childhood rang out in it, wailing for a beloved toy dangled in the unreachable, uncaring hands of a bully.

He had a second to consider that if Sherlock had been a terrible child, Mycroft was surely beyond imagining and to experience a brief bright flare of anger at the unflattering implications before the world grayed out in pain and vertigo.

And then he was on the couch, shirt pushed up around his chest as Sherlock examined his bandages. “John? Good, back with me. There’s no blood but I can call an ambulance. Do you think the stitches are out?”

"What? No, don't call an - let go of me." John tugged his shirt back down and then let his head drop back to ride out the wave of spinning nausea. 

"I can get you tea."

"Yes, do that. I can throw it up on your shoes." John opened his eyes cautiously. Sherlock hovered, all white face and spread hands. Their eyes met and John tried, really tried to keep his face neutral, to focus on the pain and the rolling in his stomach. Surely that would be distraction enough, surely that would cover the fact that he’d heard.

Sherlock turned away abruptly. "I, um. Yes. Tea." He almost ran to the kitchen. 

John let his head fall back again, more gently this time. "You don't need to," he called, hoping against hope that they could argue about that. A good argument would take the awkwardness away, put them back on equal footing. He smiled to himself. /Well, you say equal./

He opened his eyes again when Sherlock cleared his throat diffidently and put a steaming cup in his hands. John chose to see that as a good sign. He was once again trusted with properly hot beverages. "I have your pills," Sherlock announced. 

"Maybe I'll let it go for a bit." John raised the cup to his lips to avert having to add anything to that and waited for the argument to erupt. He had heard so much about staying ahead of the pain that he could practically sing along.

But Sherlock just looked away and nodded. "I'm sorry that you had to hear that," he said flatly. 

"Sorry, hear what?"

Because Sherlock Holmes was going to have any truck with polite fictions. "Mycroft - and myself."

"Ah." John took another sip of his tea, hot enough and strong. "I know what it's like with family."

"I truly hope you don't," Sherlock murmured and took himself back to the kitchen.

After a while he ran out of things to pretend to be doing - John was under no illusions that he was actually washing dishes - and came back out to sit in the chair John himself usually occupied. He grimaced, fished around in the chair, and then handed John the remote with a contrite look so unlike himself that John actually felt his throat tighten. Telling himself it was just the painkillers, he decided to start that augment. They were both overdue. "I do have a sister, you know. Harry and I have had some real set-tos."

"Um." Sherlock pulled a book out from under the chair. "Really, John. Dan Brown?"

"I like fiction," he replied, willing to be drawn on damn near any subject, really. As long as the hangdog look left the grey eyes and the sharp chin came up to meet his challenge. "Though I'll give you, that one is utter crap."

"Well, at least your mind has not totally gone soft." Sherlock twisted in the chair, reading the dust jacket with one leg hanging over an arm. His foot bounced up and down a bit. "I could recommend -"

"No, thank you." John risked a grin. "How about a movie?" Sherlock was staring at the book, not seeing it. "Sherlock? Movie?"

"Did you ever think that you might be adopted?" 

"Excuse me?"

Sherlock's eyes had gone far away and he was completely still. Sometimes he looked like that when he was seeing an answer but this was more inward. Darker. "That you didn't belong with the people who said they were your family." He looked up into John's silence and shook his head. "Of course it's nonsense. If I was adopted, I would certainly know."

"Of course you would," John said softly. "You'd see that at once."

Sherlock nodded. "They all hate me. Mycroft -" He laughed sharply, the sound forced out of him. Completely unlike his usual dark chuckle. "Mycroft says he's my archenemy and he's the best of them."

The remote fell forgotten to John's side. "He said you would think of him as an archenemy," he said. "Mycroft said he worried about you."

"Worries I'll do something - something -"

"Insane?" John tried the smile again.

Which Sherlock didn't return. "Yes. Criminal. Worse, embarrassing to the family."

"Would you?"

To his amazement and satisfaction, the gambit worked. Sherlock actually looked at him and saw him. "I already have, I think. They just don't know about it."

The silence grew while John considered his next move. "I've got an uncle in Kent that left his wife to raise ferrets."

"I'm sorry, what?"

John could have cheered. He hadn't expected it to work so well. "Ferrets. He's got a website and everything. Pedigree ferrets."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"He's famous for it. Well, as ferret farmers go." Sherlock stared at him as if he might be reconsidering the ambulance, or possibly a psychiatrist, and John let him stew a minute. Then he leaned forward, risking the pain to get every inch of attention. "Everyone has difficult relatives, Sherlock. It's fine."

Sherlock sat back in the chair and watched him. Studied him. “What you heard me say -”

“Fine.” Sherlock’s eyes narrowed and John turned on the TV to distract himself from that regard. He knew, of course, there was no hiding from it. “It’s all fine,” he said over the babble of something loud and obnoxious. 

He almost missed Sherlock’s answer. “Thank you.”

 

"Are you watching?"

"What?"

"Are you watching?" John gestured at the TV and the newscaster mouthing solemnly and silently. "The news?

"Oh. No." Sherlock waved a hand at it as if he expected it to vanish at his command, a sulky maharaja sprawled across the couch in his bathrobe and jeans. And he still managed to make John feel a bit frumpy in his jumper.

"Good. Thanks." John sat in the armchair, putting his tea down by the leg and scooping up the remote. He took off the mute and turned it up just in time to hear the first strains of Jessica and see the first graphics flood over the screen.

Sherlock's eyes snapped open. "Oh, no."

"I'm sorry?"

"Not that. Why do you watch that?"

"You said you weren’t watching."

(Jennifer Wilson had been killed six months ago. They'd known each other a while when this happened. The newness had rubbed off a bit, disintegrated into a settled morning routine and a handful of well rehearsed arguments. And some words that meant other words, some jokes that didn't need to be spoken aloud, some rules that never got broken. John's cane lived under his bed. He rarely thought about it anymore.)

Sherlock sat up and John sat back. "I'm not. Why do you watch it anyway?"

John fished around for his cup without taking his eyes off Sherlock in case he made a dive for the remote. "I like it."

"That makes no sense."

He sighed. "Why does it make no sense? Why does it have to make sense?"

"You don't like cars." Sherlock sat back as well now, digging in and getting ready for a fight. His eyes sparkled. "You don't know anything about engines."

“Never said I did.” John buried the remote beside him in the chair. “Can I please just watch the telly?”

“Of course. No one is preventing you.”

/He probably really thinks that,/ John thought wearily. His shoulder hurt from the change in weather and the cold coming on. 

“I just don’t see the appeal to a person to whom mechanics are irrelevant.”

“I don’t watch it for the cars,” John said, irritated into the truth. “I just like to see what they get up to.”

Sherlock watched him for a moment to see if anything else would spill out. When John stared stubbornly at the screen, he gave it a cursory glance as well. “They’re not very attractive.”

“What?”

“Well, the one, I suppose. But he’s far too short for you.”

“What on earth is that supposed to mean?”

“Celebrity is generally based on appearance,” Sherlock went on blithely. He was out of his sulk and at least John was grateful for that. “These three seem to have run counter to that trend. So their attraction must lie elsewhere.”

“Yeah, that’s enough talking, okay?” John smiled a tight smile in Sherlock’s direction. “All right?”

The silence lasted almost until the first lap in the reasonably priced car. “They wouldn’t like you, you know.”

John closed his eyes. He started counting. It was going to take considerably more than ten.

“Of course, you wouldn’t like them either, not really.” Sherlock pointed at the screen. “He’s too loud and wrong most of the time, he’s too loud as well and has anger management problems that too closely mirror you own - and he’s short - and he - well, I imagine he might do but your OCD is better managed and his lack of prompt action would eventually frustrate you.

"He would frustrate me. Really." 

Sherlock raised an eyebrow at him. "Sarcasm ill becomes you."

"I don't watch it to because I think we'd be best mates in life," John said, trying to remember which number he stopped on so he could start again.

"Really? People tend to watch television that reflects their own imaginings of a perfect or desirable life. I was reading about it in the Lancet."

"I remember the article, seeing as how I bought the paper." That rolled off Sherlock, who tended to regard anything in the flat as completely within his purview. John shook it off. Hardly worth arguing about a week old copy of the Lancet. "I didn't think you went in for cheap psychology."

The look Sherlock gave him was classic down-the-nose snobbery, so much so that John felt he'd scored a point regardless of his own rise in blood pressure because of it. "Naturally, I don't. I was simply trying to ascertain why you like this particular waste of time over, say, a crossword, which would be both educational and much, much quieter."

"I do crosswords," John said.

"But you aren't now."

"No." They locked gazes again and John wondered what it was like at those Christmas dinners Mycroft had mentioned. Twenty minutes of sniping and then not being able to see what you were eating for fear of losing a stare off. "I just like it. Let it go at that."

"You must have a reason."

"I -" And then because he was becoming interested in the argument for its own sake and because he couldn't hear the argument on the telly anyway and because it was Sherlock , John stopped to consider. "It's - you remember the zoo the other day?"

"Unlikely to forget it," Sherlock said. "Where did you get that rope?"

"It was in the staff room next the anchovies. That's not what I was going to say. Remember the panthers?"

Sherlock looked honestly surprised. "I didn't think you'd seen them."

"Of course I saw them."

"Well, we were running fairly quickly at the time, and I know you don't always notice the details of a crime scene."

John chose to ignore that particular comment. "I've always liked the big cats. Liked looking at them. But I don't want to own one. I mean, it's one thing to look at them in the zoo - or when you're being fired at by persons unknown and running for your life - but you can't have one in your flat. I can't have one here. Sometimes it‘s good to look at things you like, even if you can‘t have them yourself." Just for a minute, he let the implications of that weigh him down. And then he remembered who he was talking to and shook it off. "I don't want them to like me. They like each other. It's fun to watch. That's all."

Sherlock considered him closely and John felt, as he usually did, the twin urges to run and hide or throw something and to watch Sherlock right back. To relax under that gaze of absolute accuracy and see what it came up with. It was like letting oneself be diagnosed, in a way; something doctors were notoriously bad at. But with Sherlock, John had found he didn't mind. Didn't mind so much. And of course, there was simply no way to stop him. 

"You like them because they like each other," Sherlock said. There was doubt in his voice.

John turned away from the TV completely. "You watch people all the time, Sherlock. You see everything. Haven't you ever just watched, I don't know, a couple on a date - you could tell if they were falling in love, probably before they knew themselves - and enjoyed seeing them enjoy it? Or the kids at the zoo? You see all the criminals in the world, how do you not see the ordinary people just having a good time, too?

"Boring," Sherlock said, but his heart wasn't in it. He studied John carefully.

"And you can quit looking at me like I'm a new species of mollusk, thank you. Which reminds me, is that dinner in the sink or something you plan to breed? Because I think they're dead."

Sherlock jumped out of his chair. "You didn't let the water out, did you? It's very important."

"No, I didn't." John sat back in his chair and turned up the volume. "I bought a bottle of wine. Just in case it was dinner."

"Well, it's not." Sherlock came back to the doorway and considered him. "Takeaway?"

"You're paying." 

To his astonishment, Sherlock smiled.

 

  
"So have you decided to go?"

John put his glass down carefully by the sink. "I thought you were asleep," he said lightly.

"I can't imagine why."

"No, neither can I," John said under his breath, then turned to smile brightly at the detective lying flat on his back on the couch. "Have I decided to go where?"

"She asked you to move in with her, didn't she?" Sherlock raised a hand toward the ceiling, looking through his fingers to find the name. "This is at least the third proposal."

"It's not a proposal," John snapped and then tried to decide why that mattered enough to merit a snap. "She did ask again."

"You're considering it."

"I - yes. I was. Am." He came in to the living room and sat down in the chair. Sherlock twisted to put John under his eyes. "I am, yes. Considering it."

"Ah." They were quiet in the dark for a moment. "Good."

"Yes? There's more, I know it."

"It would make sense to go." The silence rang again. John could hear the words that they weren't saying. "I'm sure Miss - um."

"Morstan," John prompted.

"Yes. I'm sure she will make you happy." 

John considered him for a minute. "Why are you so opposed to Mary?"

Dark circled around them. "I'm sorry, Mary?"

"Yes, Mary. Why can't you remember her name?" He was glad he had put the glass down now because he would have thrown it certainly. "She was your client, for God's sake."

"My client," Sherlock mused.

"That was how we met," John said and felt a certain vindictive cruelty in driving the point home. "You introduced us."

"Did I?" The voice in the dark was sour now. "Well, I've done you a favor, then."

"Sherlock," John started and then stopped. He had no idea how to continue. Instead he sighed and folded forward to rest his chin in his hands. "Why are you so opposed to Mary?"

"I'm not. Of course I'm not." Sherlock sat up and frowned at him, clearly bent on being logical. "Why would I be?"

John didn't look up. "My question exactly."

"At any rate, I'm not capable of being upset by the dull little intrigues of your affairs," Sherlock said. "Sociopath, remember?"

"Yes, I was wondering when that particular card would come into play." Sherlock pointed his sulky face at the floor. "Why can't you remember her name? You remember everything, every corpse, every client-"

"Not every client, obviously."

John looked up at him and was startled to meet Sherlock's grey eyes. "Of course you do. Who was the first one? The first case I went on?"

"Jennifer Wilson," Sherlock said promptly then had the grace to look surprised. "A year and two months ago, almost to the day. She lived in Cardiff but came to London to meet her lover." He smiled just slightly. "Journeys end in lovers' meeting."

"Hah. Yes, very nice. And you could tell me every corpse since then. But not the live ones, oh no."

"The live ones are -"

John held his gaze. "Not important?"

"Well. Yes. In a manner of speaking."

And John just had to laugh, a swift bitter sound. "Of course. God, you're incredible. We're just not important, are we, the ones that survive you?"

Sherlock stood up and crossed to the fireplace. He kept his back to John but his voice became swift and soft, the first small rattle of stones before an avalanche. "Your name is John Hamish Watson. You were born in Edinburgh, as was your father. You moved back to England after his death in a car accident in 1989. Your sister began drinking about the same age. You are five feet six inches tall and one hundred seventy pounds. Your eyes are blue but so dark people think they're brown. You make a wonderful quiche but you never make it when I'm around because you don't think I'll like it. You like jazz and rock and some Scottish folk songs, presumably learned from your father before he died. You hum them when you're reading. You are more than a very good doctor, you are excellent. You had several offers to head surgeries before heading off to enlist, both because you felt obligated to provide for your mother and to escape your sister's growing drinking problem." John stood and took a step towards him and Sherlock flinched, actually flinched from him. "I know everything about you. I know that right now you want me to tell you why you shouldn't go and I can't because it doesn‘t make sense that you should want that."

"It doesn't make sense," John said and it wasn't a question.

"It doesn't. You don't. You never did."

"It sounds,” John stopped to rub the back of his neck, “it sounds like you have me all figured out."

Sherlock turned then and faced him with something like desperation in his face. "You? Of course I can figure you out. Easy." He threw his hands out, warding John off or maybe trying to draw him closer. "You're simple."

"Simple," John said. Almost growled.

"Just like a prime number. Simple. Irreducible. Irrefutable. I can't argue with you. I know everything!" and for once it was a cry of terrible despair instead of overweening ego. "I always know. But now there is this great exception and where there were definite statements, there's an addition. Everyone is an idiot, except John. Everyone is easy to fool, except John. Everyone is boring, except John. I can deconstruct anyone’s motive, take it right back to the squalid mess of fear and greed and self preservation that people live in. But not yours. Not you. Why not you?”

“If I had no sense of self preservation, we wouldn’t be having this discussion,” John said.

Sherlock stared at him. “You know something. Tell me.” It was a command and almost a plea.

“I can’t. You have to crack this yourself.” He looked bewildered and John decided to turn up the pressure by telling another truth. “She said this was the last time she’d ask, you know. There’s an end to anyone’s patience. You can afford the flat yourself now, with all the work coming in. You’ll be fine.”

Sherlock glanced around the room, eyes wide and pale in his pale face. “I don’t want it. Why did I say that? Why does it matter? It’s just a place. It would be the same place without you.”

“Yes, I suppose it would.” John turned back to the kitchen.

A thud from behind him stopped him in his tracks. “Don’t.”

Sherlock had fallen to his knees. It would have been a dramatic pose but for the hanging arms, the hanging head. “Don’t,” Sherlock said again and John recognized the tone, heard the words out of thin air that he wasn’t saying, couldn’t say.

It was enough to be getting on with.

“All right,” John said and Sherlock raised his head. John nodded at him. “I won’t go. Really.”

He could move quickly, faster than anyone for all his languor in the normal course of events, and John just had time to gasp in surprise before being overwhelmed by the embrace. “Thank you,” Sherlock murmured near his ear. The long arms around him shook. “Oh, thank you.”

John returned the hug gently, trying to decided why someone so tall and strong and sure as Sherlock Holmes could feel so fragile now that they were close. “It’s all right. Honestly. It’s fine.”

“It is.” And then, just as suddenly, Sherlock retreated. But not all the way, only to arm’s length. “You were?”

“I was what?”

“You were considering it?” John simply tilted his head and smiled. He loved this bit, he could admit that now. The part where Sherlock figured it out was the best bit. 

Of course he thought he probably wouldn’t tell Sherlock that just yet.

“You already said no,” Sherlock said and there was wonder and irritation in his voice in almost equal measure. “You walked in here knowing you’d already turned her down. “ His hands tightened on John’s shoulders. “You bastard.”

“Self preservation,” John said quietly. “I’m not as noble as you seem to think I am.”

Sherlock looked at him, really looked, and John stayed still and quiet under his gaze. “Yes, you are. But why risk -?” His voice trailed off and he simply stared.

“I think it’s one of those things that isn’t going to make sense,” John said. “Not to you, anyway. All right?”

“Yes,” Sherlock said. Wonder in his voice. “All right.”

(They know each other well enough, finally, for this to happen.)


End file.
